Joseph Blevins Jr.

Cody police say they caught a burglar red-handed last week.

They believe Joseph R. Blevins Jr., 44, snuck into a storage unit and tried breaking into an adjoining unit in the wee hours of Friday morning.

Blevins is facing felony counts of burglary, attempted burglary and possession of a burglar’s tools in connection with the allegations.

It was around 2:40 a.m. Friday that Cody Police Sgt. John Harris saw a pickup truck drive “very slowly” and park among Cody Self Storage’s units along Sheridan Avenue.

“Due to reports of thefts from storage units at various locations in the City of Cody recently, as well as the time of night and suspicious behavior of the person driving the truck, I decided to approach on foot and investigate,” Harris wrote in an affidavit filed in support of the charges.

As he approached an unlocked unit at the facility, Harris said he heard what sounded like a drill and banging metal. After a couple other officers arrived as back up, he knocked on the door of the unit. Blevins opened up and explained he was planning to rent the space.

He denied having any power tools, but police found a battery-powered Bosch driver hidden in the front wall. They also noticed that nine or so screws had been removed from one of the metal side walls, which led to a neighboring unit; Blevins reportedly said he was just trying to see if could build shelves inside the unit. 

“I’m not stealing anything, man,” he reportedly told the officers.

Police had him put the screws back and seized the drill while they checked out his story. They arrested Blevins around 9 p.m. Friday, after learning from the facility’s owner that Blevins was not renting a unit, had no connections to the units’ renters and “no permission or otherwise legal reason” to be there that night.

If someone had gotten into the adjoining unit, the affidavit indicates it wouldn’t have been a particularly lucrative heist: The elderly renter’s daughter told police it only held house-related items and that “there wasn’t anything of high value or importance” inside.

When they took Blevins into custody, Cody police found a small baggy of apparent psychedelic mushrooms in his pocket and tacked on a misdemeanor count of possessing a controlled substance.

At a Monday hearing in Park County Circuit Court, Judge Joey Darrah adopted the prosecution’s recommendation and set Blevins’ bond at $15,000 cash or surety.

Blevins had asked for a signature bond or a “drastically” lower surety sum,  explaining that all of his money goes toward providing for his children.

However, he was ultimately able to post $15,000 in cash on Tuesday afternoon and was released from custody pending further proceedings.

A preliminary hearing is tentatively scheduled for May 15.